Poetry content
10
Oh, direful day that saw Rebellion’s guns
On valiant Sumter opening from the land;
That saw white-handed Chivalry’s proud sons
Their country’s standard trail with impious hand
Saw erring Carolina’s ablest ones
Invoke red war on their palmetto strand;
And, in their frenzy, send the challenge forth
That roused the legions of the loyal North.
13
I stood where the contending armies bled—
A hundred thousand men on either side.
The past returned. Around me rose the dead,
The brazen bugles rang out far and wide;
The clouds of thund’rous battle round me spread
O’er lurid fields, where mighty chiefs did ride,
And ranks of serried steel swung into sight,
Flashing afar—an army in its might.
14
And there was silence in the pulsing air,
While in the noon sun fluttered banners gay—
A lull that breathed the courage of despair;
A hush which meant a pause in which to pray,
There youths whose lives had never known a care
Confronted veterans with locks of aged gray;
Before the cool glare of the veteran,
The blue-eyed youth stood dauntless, man to man.
35
Free labor still our country’s hope remains,—
In this our largest manhood shall be grown;
The spirit of vast woods and vaster plains,—
Canyons and geysers of the Yellowstone;
Alaskan summits, where bald winter reigns,
And rests on base of gold his icy throne,—
These all are prophecies of what shall be,
When Freedom’s sons shall leave their brothers free.
56
Farewell, alas! my native land adored!
I’ve sung thy praises in a faithful strain;
But westward life’s imperial tides have poured,
Eddying in towns, and sweeping on again,
While braver hearts have in their strength ignored
The old South limitations which remain.
And I must leave the land which gave me birth,
Or pine, an alien, on my native hearth.
O say, can you see, by the dawn’s early light,
What so proudly we hailed at the twilight’s last gleaming?
Whose broad stripes and bright stars through the perilous fight,
O’er the ramparts we watched were so gallantly streaming;
And the rocket’s red glare, the bombs bursting in air,
Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there;
O say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave
O’er the land of the free, and the home of the brave?
On the shore dimly seen through the mists of the deep,
Where the foe’s haughty host in dread silence reposes,
What is that which the breeze, o’er the towering steep,
As it fitfully blows, now conceals, now discloses?
Now it catches the gleam of the morning’s first beam,
In full glory reflected now shines on the stream;
’Tis the star-spangled banner; O long may it wave
O’er the land of the free, and the home of the brave!
And where is that band who so vauntingly swore
That the havoc of war and the battle’s confusion
A home and a country should leave us no more?
Their blood has washed out their foul footsteps’ pollution.
No refuge could save the hireling and slave,
From the terror of flight and the gloom of the grave;
And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave
O’er the land of the free, and the home of the brave!
O! thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand
Between their loved homes and the war’s desolation!
Blest with victory and peace, may the heav’n-rescued land,
Praise the power that hath made and preserved us a nation.
Then conquer we must, for our cause it is just.
And this be our motto— “In God is our trust;”
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave
O’er the land of the free, and the home of the brave.
Thou sing’st alone on the bare wintry bough,
As if Spring with its leaves were around thee now;
And its voice that was heard in the laughing rill,
And the breeze as it whispered o’er meadow and hill,
Still fell on thine ear, as it murmured along
To join the sweet tide of thine own gushing song.
Sing on—though its sweetness was lost on the blast,
And the storm has not heeded thy song as it passed,
Yet its music awoke in a heart that was near,
A thought whose remembrance will ever prove dear;
Though the brook may be frozen, though silent its voice,
And the gales through the meadows no longer rejoice,
Still I felt, as my ear caught thy glad note of glee,
That my heart in life’s winter might carol like thee.
Where have you been the long day through,
Little brothers of mine?
For soon the world shall belong to you,
Yours to mar or to build anew—
Have you been to learn what the world shall do,
Little brothers going home?
We have been to learn through the weary day
Where the great looms echo and crash and sway—
The world has willed it, and we obey,
Elder brother.
What did you learn till set of sun,
Little brothers of mine,
Down where the great looms wove and spun,
You who are many where we are one
(We whose day is so nearly done),
Little brothers toiling home?
We have learned the things that the mill-folk said,
How Man is cruel and God is dead…
And how to spin with an even thread,
Elder brother.
What did you win with the thing they taught,
Little brothers of mine,
You whose sons shall have strength you brought,
Fashion their lives of the faith you bought,
Follow afar the ways you sought,
Little brothers stealing home?
Shattered body and stunted brain,
Hearts made hard with the need of gain,
These we won and must give again,
Elder brother.
How shall the world fare in your hand,
Little brothers of mine,
When you shall stand where now we stand?
Will you lift a light in the darkened land
Or fire its ways with a burning brand,
Little brothers creeping home?
What of the way the world shall fare?
What the world has given the world must bear…
We are tired—ah, tired—and we cannot care,
Elder brother!
You were too kind to come at all.
The door closed on you, and my hall
Shivered in sudden naked shame.
I whispered it was not to blame
And followed you within, to where
You were awaited by my chair.
It was so small, and you sat down
With a so gracious smile—a frown
Would have gone better with that wall;
You were too kind to smile at all.
You stretched a hand toward the grate;
Its welcome was inadequate.
You looked about you and pretended
The carpet and the picture blended.
I looked—and all my furnishings
Had turned their heads: the sorry things!
You said you felt at home—a lie
My misery was finished by.
Even your guilelessness was gall.
You were too kind to come at all.
My father is a quiet man
With sober, steady ways;
For simile, a folded fan;
His nights are like his days.
My mother’s life is puritan,
No hint of cavalier,
A pool so calm you’re sure it can
Have little depth to fear.
And yet my father’s eyes can boast
How full his life has been;
There haunts them yet the languid ghost
Of some still sacred sin.
And though my mother chants of God,
And of the mystic river,
I’ve seen a bit of checkered sod
Set all her flesh aquiver.
Why should he deem it pure mischance
A son of his is fain
To do a naked tribal dance
Each time he hears the rain?
Why should she think it devil’s art
That all my songs should be
Of love and lovers, broken heart,
And wild sweet agony?
Who plants a seed begets a bud,
Extract of that same root;
Why marvel at the hectic blood
That flushes this wild fruit?